Canada: Jihad mass murder plotter shouted Qur’an verses at jury

To the authorities, this was indication that he must be insane. Because it couldn’t have anything to do with the Qur’an exhorting him to commit violence and making him believe his jihad mass murder plot was justified, right?

To the average person, berating a jury with passages from the Qur’an while on trial for an alleged Islamic terrorist plot would be pretty crazy. But it wasn’t until after Chiheb Esseghaier’s May conviction for multiple terrorism charges in a plot to derail a Via passenger train that the lawyer appointed to assist Esseghaier — despite his repeated refusals to seek any professional legal advice — raised the issue of Esseghaier’s mental state.

Esseghaier consented when asked whether he would be willing to participate in a psychiatric assessment to assist the judge prior to sentencing.

Dr. Lisa Ramshaw conducted the psychiatric assessment and raised concerns in her testimony this week that Esseghaier suffers from grandiose delusions and possible schizophrenia. The timing of these revelations — at the commencement of a sentencing hearing and months after a lengthy jury trial — raises the spectre of a new round of legal wrangling just when prosecutors thought they were coming to the end of the proverbial tunnel.

Legal fitness — the question Justice Michael Code is now being asked to grapple with — shouldn’t be confused with the broader question of “not criminally responsible by reason of mental defect.”

Helpfully truncated by legal wags as “NCR,” you might know it more colloquially as “the insanity defence.” Whether Esseghaier was so mentally ill that he could not appreciate the nature and consequences of his actions while plotting to send a passenger train hurtling to the bottom of a cliff was an issue never raised at trial.

Instead, what has now been put in play by the psychiatric assessment is the question of whether Esseghaier is sufficiently in control of his faculties to understand the court process and participate in it. If Esseghaier is found unfit, the proceedings against him would be frozen and he would remain in legal limbo until he is deemed legally fit to proceed.

But if Esseghaier’s delusional schizophrenia is so manifest now that it short-circuits his sentencing, it might also cause the court to ask: “Was this guy fit enough to go through the trial in the first place?” That question raises the disturbing spectre of the jury verdict being cast aside and a whole new trial after (if ever) Esseghaier regains his cognitive faculties.

So what does he have to do to be found unfit in Canada? Refusing to hire a lawyer and waxing poetically about Shariah law — however ill-advised — is not enough to cast doubt on your ability to understand the trial proceedings. A person so committed to the twisted teachings of a perverted strain of Islam might well make the perfectly rational choice to refuse the assistance of an infidel lawyer while using his trial to spew condemnations of Western democratic law. Some might call this behaviour crazy. For Esseghaier it might be more aptly titled Tuesday.

If you’re looking for a clue as to Code’s leanings on the question of Esseghaier’s fitness, it’s worth recalling that in May he said, “I don’t think strong religious beliefs, even extreme ones, can be equated with mental disorder” and noted that throughout the trial Esseghaier’s behaviour, while at times disruptive, was always “understandable and consistent … driven by his strong religious belief which he always explains and articulates.”…

Comments

…except that the following precepts are from the Sharia law manual “The Reliance of the Traveller”:

Chapter O9.0: Jihad

O: Jihad means to war against non-Muslims, and is etymologically derived from the word mujahada signifying warfare to establish the religion.

The scriptural basis for jihad, prior to scholarly consensus (def: b7) is such Koranic verses as:

-1- “Fighting is prescribed for you” (Koran 2:216);

-2- “Slay them wherever you find them” (Koran 4:89);

-3- “Fight the idolators utterly” (Koran 9:36);

O9.1: The Obligatory Character of Jihad

Jihad is a communal obligation (def: c3.2). When enough people perform it to successfully accomplish it, it is no longer obligatory upon others (O: the evidence for which is the Prophet’s saying (Allah bless him and give him peace),

-“He who provides the equipment for a soldier in jihad has himself performed jihad,”

-“Jihad is a communal obligation,” meaning upon the Muslims each year.

O9.8: The Objectives of Jihad

The caliph (o25) makes war upon Jews, Christians, and Zoroastrians (N: provided he has first invited them to enter Islam in faith and practice, and if they will not, then invited them to enter the social order of Islam by paying the non-Muslim poll tax (jizya, def: o11.4)

OMG……. tell me it ain’t so. They’ve got the goods on this guy. He’s not denied his intentions. He’s clearly the epitome of radical Islamic behaviour. Please Canada, don’t go all soft and mushy on those who would kill us. Lock him up forever!

There is no distinction between good Islam and bad Islam. There is only one Islam, and to Muslims Islam is synonymous with ‘good’.

By pursuing the idea that Esseghaier is insane the court is trying exculpate all of Islam as the source of Esseghaier’s ideas.

Truly, the Koran, and authorized commentaries, hadiths, Sira, and Sharia law are the source of jihad.

The court should compare Esseghaier with the criminals of the Nuremberg Trials. They were not ‘insane’, since they were competent, organized individuals. The Nazis and Esseghaier were deluded by OVERVALUED IDEATION….rather than ‘insanity’.

Commenter Charli Main posits that ‘if’ the accused in this Jihad Trial were Christian in any Islamistan country, – he would be beheaded without further ado! Is there a ‘Risk’ that even ‘speculating’ on whether he is mentally compent to be ‘Sentenced’ is being disrespectful and ‘insulting’ to Islam?”

“the twisted teachings of a perverted strain of Islam”, Mr. Prutschi?
This is the familiar old tired assertion, once again completely unbacked.
What part of Koran 9:5, “Kill the unbelievers wherever you find them”, don’t they understand?

The psychologist in this case noticed the same thing Nicolai Sennels did, but on a much larger scale, I quote from Sennels work here at Jihadwatch.

“The psychological problem within Islam

The problem with Islam and Muslim culture is that there are so many psychological factors pushing its followers towards a violent attitude against non-Muslims that a general violent clash is — at least from a psychological perspective — inevitable. With such strong pressure and such strong emotions within such a large group of people — all pitched against us — we are facing the perfect storm, and I see no possibilities of turning it around. For people to change, they have to want it, to be allowed to change, and to be able to change — and only a tiny minority of Muslims have such lucky conditions.

Far too many people underestimate the power of psychology embedded in religion and culture. As we have already seen, no army of social workers, generous welfare states, sweet-talking politicians, politically correct journalists or democracy-promoting soldiers can stop these enormous forces. Sensible laws on immigration and Islamisation in our own countries can limit the amount of suffering, but based on my education and professional experience as a psychologist for Muslims, I estimate that we will not be able to deflect or avoid this many-sided, aggressive movement against our culture.”

It’s interesting, a journalist will do whatever it takes it seems to uphold the meme, most of the time.

The journalists take away, “So what does he have to do to be found unfit in Canada? Refusing to hire a lawyer and waxing poetically about Shariah law — however ill-advised — is not enough to cast doubt on your ability to understand the trial proceedings. A person so committed to the twisted teachings of a perverted strain of Islam might well make the perfectly rational choice to refuse the assistance of an infidel lawyer while using his trial to spew condemnations of Western democratic law. Some might call this behaviour crazy. For Esseghaier it might be more aptly titled Tuesday.”

Most journalists can not consider that this “twisted version” of Islam, while surprisingly mainstream according to most polling might not actually be “twisted”, then follow the larger social questions to conclusion. This is a subject far too complex for 99% of the media.

“The diagnosis appears to threaten the legal integrity of one of Canada’s most dramatic terror trials, raising the possibility Ontario has convicted a man when he was not only unrepresented by counsel, by his own choice, but unfit even to stand trial. He now faces a life sentence.”

Lisa Ramshaw, who examined Esseghaier, has not yet been cross-examined, but her diagnosis of schizophrenia was more robustly justified. Esseghaier himself has demonstrated his peculiarities, from picking at his beard and sleeping in court to ranting at the judge, even once giving him the thumbs up sign.

“As a consequence of (Esseghaier’s) psychosis, that is his loss of touch with reality and his delusional beliefs, it is my opinion that he is not able to communicate and participate in the court proceedings,” said Ramshaw, a senior forensic psychiatrist with the Centre for Addiction & Mental Health in Toronto and one of Canada’s top experts on criminal insanity, for defence and prosecution alike.

“He believes he is a visitor to the court,” she said, there only to communicate his views of Islam. Indeed, Judge Michael Code has started proceedings by referring to him as a spiritual adviser, which has partly placated Esseghaier’s demands to be tried under Shariah law, rather than Canada’s Criminal Code.

Tuesday’s sentencing hearing degenerated such that Code removed Esseghaier from the courtroom for disrupting the proceedings by trying to sleep across four chairs in the prisoner’s dock, in protest at Ramshaw’s testimony.

“I don’t want to listen to the lies of this woman,” he shouted.

But it also offered much to illustrate her diagnosis.

NO, LIBERAL CRIMINALS – IT DOESN’T.

ALL IT SHOWS IS THAT HE REJECTS THE JURISDICTION OF THE COURT TO TRY HIM, BECAUSE TO HIM (AND HE’S FULLY JUSTIFIED BY SHARIA IN THIS)

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